Hector Vasconcelos

Héctor Enrique Vasconcelos y Cruz (born 14 February 1945) is a Mexican politician and diplomat. He has served as the permanent representative of Mexico to the United Nations since 2024 and was previously the ambassador to Denmark, Norway and Iceland.

Following the 2018 general election, he was expected to be appointed the secretary of foreign affairs by incoming president Andrés Manuel López Obrador. Following his election as a national-list senator for the National Regeneration Movement (Morena), however, it was announced on 5 July 2018 that Marcelo Ebrard would serve as foreign secretary. Had Vasconcelos assumed the minsterial role, one of his main goals would have been to improve NAFTA.

Early years Héctor Vasconcelos was born in Mexico City on 14 February 1945, the only child of politician and writer José Vasconcelos and pianist Esperanza Cruz.

He studied music at conservatories in Mexico City and Geneva. He also earned a bachelor's in political science and international relations at Harvard University, a master's in political history from the University of Cambridge, and a doctorate in the same discipline from the University of Oxford. He also chaired the Senate's Foreign Affairs Committee and sat on the foreign affairs committees for North America, Latin America and the Caribbean, and Europe.

On 14 December 2023 he resigned his Senate seat following his ratification to serve as permanent representative of Mexico to the United Nations in New York.

Honours